LAHORE: The confrontation between the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz and the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf heated up on Wednesday with Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s camp announcing that he would address a rally on Sept 30 in Sangla Hill, on the other side of Lahore, the day the opposition party would hold its Raiwind march.

The announcement about the PML-N rally came the day the PTI chose Adda Plot on Raiwind Road, about 5km from the prime minister’s palatial Jati Umra residence, as the venue of its Sept 30th anti-graft protest.

Clearing the confusion over the place of its protest, the PTI also announced that no party worker would go to Jati Umra.

PTI leaders visited various places on Raiwind Road before deciding the venue for their “historic” rally.

Announcing the venue, PTI’s central Punjab chief Abdul Aleem Khan told reporters that the party had made arrangements for the security of the participants in its rally. “A formal request has also been made to the Lahore police chief for providing security cover to the protesters, particularly at the protest venue,” he said.

Punjab Parliamentary Secretary for Information and Culture Rana Muhammad Arshad told Dawn that the prime minister had agreed to address the rally where he would also inaugurate the Sangla Hill interchange and lay the foundation stone of an overhead bridge and the Shahkot interchange.

The prime minister’s address has ostensibly been planned as part of the ruling party’s strategy to counter the PTI’s rally aimed at mounting pressure on Mr Sharif to present himself and his children for accountability regarding the Panama Papers scandal about offshore wealth.

The PML-N leadership finalised the strategy after getting input from several ministers and legislators. It was proposed that the PML-N should also put up a ‘big show’ the same day PTI chief Imran Khan planned to lead a march on Raiwind.

There was consensus that it would provide an opportunity to the PML-N to demonstrate its political strength and prevent the PTI from getting marathon media coverage of its protest.

“The prime minister’s address on the same day will give a clear message that the PML-N’s agenda is progressive and the PTI’s regressive,” Mr Arshad said, adding that the people would be more interested on Sept 30 in listening to the prime minister, who was currently in the United States to fight the case of Kashmir and Pakistan.

The PML-N had decided to give a ‘free hand’ to Mr Khan for his Raiwind march, primarily seeing the fate of PTI’s last rally in Lahore, held on Sept 3, he added.

“The PML-N leadership believes that the PTI will get further marginalised politically after the Raiwind march... so it should be given a free hand like its past rallies,” a party leader said.

Meanwhile, the Punjab government has decided to seal the road leading from Adda Plot to the prime minister’s residence with shipping containers.

It was also learnt that Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif had reprimanded his government’s spokesman for hurling threats at protesters and asked the PML-N workers to stay peaceful.

The PTI’s central Punjab regional set-up has begun preparations for the protest.

The party has assigned duties to its leaders in various districts to ensure a successful show with massive participation as well as asked leaders in Kasur, Sheikhupura and Nankana to warmly welcome the caravans coming from other areas of the province.

While the PTI leaders are making all-out efforts to show unity, an in-house fight is on and the party’s women and youth wings have publically rejected the order for their dissolution issued by secretary general Jahangir Khan Tareen.

All other opposition parties have already distanced themselves from the PTI as they did not buy the idea of marching on the prime minister’s residence.

Khawar Ghumman adds from Islamabad: Last week, the PTI chairman had asked the party’s chapters across the country to join him in Raiwind where he would address the rally.

He announced that processions from all over the country would begin travelling towards Raiwind from Sept 24.

After the selection of the venue of the rally by the Punjab chapter, a PTI insider said other parties would be formally invited to participate in the protest against the government’s stubbornness against holding free and fair investigations into the Panama Papers revelations.

To start with, Mr Tareen asked Awami Muslim League chief Sheikh Rashid Ahmad to join the march.

Talking to Dawn, PTI spokesman Naeemul Haq said the party’s entire focus would now be on making the rally a huge success.

Khan’s statement on Kashmir

In a statement, the PTI chairman called upon the United Nations member states, meeting for the 71st General Assembly session in New York, to fulfil their commitment to the people of Kashmir, reiterating their right to self-determination repeatedly promised in UN Security Council resolutions.

He pointed out that in 1999 the Security Council had fulfilled similar commitments made to East Timor and demanded that the same resoluteness be shown on the issue of Jammu and Kashmir.

Published in Dawn September 22nd, 2016